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Veteran York educator blasts board on racist, anti-Muslim incidents

The head of equity for the York Region school board has written a scathing letter to senior staff, blasting the board for refusing to properly deal with complaints of racism and also contradicting the director’s claims about how an investigation into a principal’s anti-Muslim social media postings was handled.

Cecil Roach, an award-winning educator, also hinted at what’s been called a “culture of fear” at the board, saying he has been treated with hostility for raising concerns and was worried about speaking out “as I strongly feared reprisal.”

He said he only wrote the letter after consulting with a lawyer who advised him he had a “legal obligation to speak up” under both the human rights and education acts.

Despite his role as head of equity — and suggestions by the board he was involved — Roach said he played no role in the probe of Markham principal Ghada Sadaka’s offensive Facebook posts.

“At two senior team meetings, I raised concerns about the manner in which this issue was handled and about the detrimental impact on our board’s corporate image and the feeling of inclusion or lack thereof of our students, parents and staff who are racialized Muslims. In fact… I stated in no uncertain terms that as a board, we appear complicit with Islamophobia.”

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Roach’s letter comes just days after Education Minister Mitzie Hunter summoned York officials to a rare meeting to discuss the discriminatory incidents, as well as openness about trustee travel, later telling the Star the board has work to do on all fronts.

In an emailed statement to the Star, Director of Education J. Philip Parappally said he’d spoken to Roach, who “was the first superintendent in the province of Ontario to be appointed to an equity portfolio” that he promoted shortly after taking the helm at the board.

“Measures and procedures have to be and are undertaken to mitigate or remediate the issue of discrimination, including anti-black racism and Islamophobia, in our learning and working environments,” Parappally wrote.

“…We all share a goal to create learning environments that are safe and welcoming for all students and staff... Roach’s letter references the important work that has already been done to support equity… and also acknowledges that there is more to be done. We take the concerns of this letter seriously and will continue our commitment to equity.”

Over the past year, the Star has detailed numerous controversies at the York Region District School Board, including racist incidents at schools that parents say went ignored, as well as a growing discontent among staff and community members who fear equity work and policies are being dismantled.

Charles Pascal, a former Ontario deputy minister of education who is now an education professor at the University of Toronto, said York’s situation, and the minister’s intervention, is unprecedented.

“My guess is that the minister felt compelled to do this because the context is already one of dysfunction at the board,” he said, adding this latest letter is “extremely serious.”

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Last week, Sadaka issued an apology on the board’s website, acknowledging her social media posts were “discriminatory” and pledging to learn from the experience. An accompanying note from Parappally suggested the superintendent of equity was working on the file — when that was never the case, Roach said.

“Unfortunately, my counsel has not been sought, my opinion has not been solicited, and I have had no input into (the) decision regarding what is clearly an equity issue,” he said in his four-page letter.

Roach also said that when he tried to discuss incidents where black students were subjected to offensive racial slurs, calling it racism, he was met “with anger and loud accusations of me raising unsubstantiated claims of racism.”

That, he said, “hurt me to the core… it was an issue affecting a core constituency.”

Roach did not respond to a request for comment for this story. His lawyer, Selwyn Pieters, declined to comment, saying the letter “speaks for itself.”

The Vaughan African Canadian Association said Roach’s letter “confirms everything our community has been saying for the past 10 years. That concerns with anti-black racism have fallen on deaf ears.

“…We no longer have any faith in the chair of the board, or in the director of education. We stand in solidarity with all communities in saying we will not accept schools that treat our children as second-class citizens and a board which fails to provide a safe and inclusive learning environment for all students,” said Executive Director Shernett Martin.

Some parents are urging the education minister to do more.

Naeem Siddiqi said Roach’s letter “confirms our worst fears… I don’t think any parent can have confidence now that the board is capable of dealing with such issues involving their children. The education minister needs to step in and investigate.”

The provincial NDP’s education critic Lisa Gretzky said “parents and students expect the government to uphold these shared values (of equity) in all Ontario schools. We’ll be closely monitoring the minister’s response to this issue to ensure that every student feels welcome and is in an environment conducive to learning.”

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